Jazz great Billie Holiday was born this month-on Wednesday, April 7th, 1915 in Philadelphia's General Hospital. Her mother, Sarah Julia Harris, was a maid. The presumed father was banjo player Clarence Holiday. Yet the baby, named Eleanor, was registered as the child of Frank DeViese, a waiter who disappeared shortly after.
If this sounds unorthodox, her whole life was, as chronicled in "With Billie," Julia Blackburn's 2005 Holiday bio. Toni Morrison says of the book, "Nowhere else is the context of her life and work so vividly captured." "With Billie" is a gritty and engrossing book with individual chapters respectively focused on reminiscences by those who knew Billie Holiday well. Each chapter reveals a side of her as experienced by that friend. The end result is a kaleidoscope of views of the complexity of Billie's personality, her talent and influences, her art, her body of work, and finally her legacy.
"With Billie" is great reading, and probably the best bio yet of this American blues jazz legend.
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